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Morgan Paar
July 2005

Three of Videomaker's editors, along with several other staff members, were like kids in a candy shop at the National Association of Broadcaster's Electronic Media Show 2005. We had five days to see over 1,400 exhibits sprawled throughout the Las Vegas Convention Center's 68-football field sized floor space. Not an easy task when over 104,000 other people are trying to do the same. Being primarily a broadcast event, we were able to immediately cross-off many of the exhibits from our to-do-list such as the news helicopters and Hummers equipped with radar dishes and get right to the products our readers are most interested in (or at least can afford).

The clear buzz-term this year was HD. Though not a new topic to NAB, it seemed to be the one thing on everyone's lips. Here is a small sample of some of the candy we got to taste:

• Apple opened the show Sunday morning with a presentation that would make Madonna or Britany Spears take note. In a tightly choreographed presentation they unveiled Final Cut Studio (Final Cut Pro 5, Soundtrack Pro, Motion 2 and DVD Studio Pro 4) with the surprising low price of $1,299. Crowds ohhhed and ahhhed as Apple techs demonstrated Soundtrack Pro, an audio editing and sound design application, just one of many awe inspiring presentations.
  www.apple.com

• Panasonic displayed its much anticipated 1080i/720p HD camera; the soon to be released AG-HVX200. Though the camera can record DV to tape, shooters will need to do more than sell their old cameras to afford the solid state P2 cards that hold the HD media files. It might be a while before this is affordable for us prosumers.
  www.panasonic.com

• JVC debuted its new HDV camera, the GY-HD100U. The most noticeable feature on this prosumer sized shoulder mount camera is the large interchangeable 16x Servo Fujinon ProHD lens (1/3-inch bayonet mount). Due to hit the streets in July, this 720p, 24 fps camera not only records to Mini DV tape but can simultaneously record to hard drive, (DTE, Direct to Edit) allowing editors to begin work immediately after a shoot.
  http://pro.jvc.com

• Though it was hard to find an exhibit booth without a Sony HDR-FX1 HDV camera as part of its presentation, Sony's big consumer release was Vegas 6 and the Vegas + DVD Production Suite, combining Vegas 6 with DVD Architect 3. This bundled HDV software is available for a SRP of $900 or $600 for Vegas 6 alone.
  http://mediasoftware.sonypictures.com

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